Dent v. Dennison
| Decision Date | 31 March 2021 |
| Docket Number | Case No. 3:18 -CV-01156 -MAB |
| Parties | CHARLES DENT, Plaintiff, v. JEFFREY M. DENNISON, ET AL., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of Illinois |
Plaintiff Charles Dent, an inmate in the custody of the Illinois Department of Corrections ("IDOC"), alleges First and Fourteenth Amendment claims, as well as a Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act ("RLUIPA") claim against Defendants, detailing that they retaliated and conspired against him by excluding him from religious services (Doc. 1). Now before the Court is Defendants Jeffrey M. Dennison, Jerid Pickford, Samuel Sterrett, Lu Walker, and Lance Mahan's motion and supporting memorandum for summary judgment (Docs. 74, 75). For the reasons set forth below, the Court grants in part and denies in part Defendants' motion for summary judgment.
Plaintiff filed this pro se civil rights action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 on May 24, 2018 (Doc. 1). Following a threshold review of the complaint pursuant to 28 USC § 1915A, Plaintiff was permitted to proceed on four claims:
(Doc. 5).
Plaintiff is currently incarcerated at Graham Correctional Center ("Graham"), but at the time of the events alleged in his complaint, he was incarcerated at Shawnee (Doc. 74, p. 2).
Defendant Sterrett was the Chaplain at Shawnee. His duties included oversight for all of the religious programs and counseling for all of the prisoners. Additionally, he oversaw scheduling of the programming and "all aspects dealing with religious programs and activities at the chapel" (Doc. 74-7, p. 16). Defendant Dennison was theChief Administrative Officer. Defendant Walker was the Assistant Warden of Shawnee. Defendant Pickford was the head of Internal Affairs ("IA") at Shawnee and investigated the PREA incident outlined in Plaintiff's complaint (Doc. 74-1, p. 4). Defendant Mahan was a volunteer chaplain at Shawnee for Protestant Services (Id. at p. 4-6).
Plaintiff has been a practicing protestant (, Baptist) for over forty years, both in and out of prison (Doc. 76, p. 16). In July 2009, he changed his religious affiliation to Catholic (Id.). He testified that he changed from Baptist to Catholic because there was a long waiting list for Baptist services while he was incarcerated at Centralia (Doc. 74-1, p. 5). He has continued to be registered as Catholic since that time (Doc. 74, p. 2; 74-1; 74-2). Plaintiff has been at numerous other IDOC facilities and testified that he was allowed to attend both Catholic and Protestant services at many of them (Doc. 74-7, pp. 7-9).
On May 10, 2016, Plaintiff arrived at Shawnee (Doc. 76, p. 16). On or around June 2016, Plaintiff requested to attend Protestant services at Shawnee, pursuant to the Illinois Administrative Code 425.30(g) (Doc. 76, p. 16). Soon after, he was approved to attend Protestant services held on Sunday at Shawnee (Id.). These services were led by Defendant Mahan (Doc. 74-1, p. 6).
In March 2018, Plaintiff submitted a written request to go to an additional Protestant service. Specifically, Plaintiff asked Defendant Sterrett to attend Friday night Protestant services (Doc. 76, p. 16).2 Plaintiff was already attending Catholic Mass onTuesday mornings and two Protestant services and so with this request, he was asking to attend four total (Id.). At the end of March 2018 or the beginning of April 2018, Defendant Sterrett approved Plaintiff to attend the Friday night Protestant service (Doc. 76, p. 16, 26; 74-7, pp. 20-21).
On April 7, 2018, Plaintiff filed a grievance against a volunteer priest, Defendant Mahan, who presided over Protestant services (Doc. 74-2, p. 30; 76, p. 17). This grievance detailed that Defendant Mahan was preaching about his hatred for homosexual, transgender, and other inmates who identify as part of the LGBTQ3 community. Plaintiff details in his grievance that Defendant Mahan pointed out specific prisoners who identify as members of the LGBTQ community, including Plaintiff (Doc. 76, pp. 23-24). During service on April 7, 2018, the same day as the grievance, Defendant Mahan kicked Plaintiff out of services because he was talking (Plaintiff says he was not) (Id.). According to Plaintiff, Defendant Mahan kicked out prisoners who identify as LGBTQ community members from services under the pretext that they are talking (Id. at p. 24). Plaintiff states that Defendant Mahan was inciting violence against inmates who identify as LGBTQ during his sermon, so he asked for Defendant Mahan to be banned from presiding over religious services at Shawnee (Id. at p. 23).
Plaintiff submitted this grievance as a non-emergency to his counselor who received the grievance on April 10, 2018 (Id.). It was then sent to Defendant Sterrett, who issued a short response on April 11, 2018, stating that the substance of the grievance warranted referral to Internal Affairs ("IA") to do a PREA investigation (Id. at p. 25). The grievance was then sent to Defendant Pickford, an IA supervisor, who is assigned to investigate PREA complaints (Id. at p. 17).
Plaintiff was interviewed about the PREA complaint by Defendant Pickford who then completed an Incident Report. The Incident Report says that Plaintiff "felt that he was being sexually harassed and that Mahan was creating a hostile environment for homosexuals" (Id. at p. 74). After the interview, Defendant Pickford took Plaintiff to the Health Care Unit to offer him mental health and medical services (Id.).
On April 14, 2018, Plaintiff received his weekly activity card, where he discovered that he was removed from Tuesday and Friday night Protestant services by Defendant Sterrett (Id. at pp. 17, 27-28). At this time, Plaintiff was still assigned to the Catholic Mass on Tuesday and the Sunday Protestant Service (Id.).
On April 14, 2018, Plaintiff filed a grievance against Defendant Sterrett for retaliation since Plaintiff believed he was responsible for taking him off of Protestant services on Tuesdays and Fridays after Plaintiff filed his April 7, 2018 grievance (Id. at p. 17). This grievance also details Plaintiff's PREA complaint on April 10, 2018 (Id. at p. 33). Plaintiff asked to be placed on Tuesday and Friday chapel services immediately, and for Defendant Mahan to be suspended (Id.). This grievance was filed as a non-emergency, and was sent to Plaintiff's counselor who responded on April 18 with, "See grievanceresponse from Chaplain Sterrett attached dated 4/18/18" (Id.). There does not appear to be a copy of Defendant Sterrett's response to this grievance in the record. This grievance was stamped as "received" by the Administrative Review Board ("ARB") on May 21, 2018. The ARB response states that the issue was appropriately addressed, as during the PREA investigation, it was realized that (Id. at p. 37).
On April 21, 2018, Plaintiff received his activity card and discovered that Defendant Sterrett had revoked his last Protestant service on Sunday (Id. at p. 18, 35). Defendant Sterrett previously testified that Plaintiff and less than 20 other prisoners were removed from the Protestant chapel line around this time due to his review of all chapel lines to "make sure that all assigned participants were compliant with 425" (Doc. 74-7, p. 21).4 5 Soon after, Defendant Sterrett testified that he also reviewed other chapel lines for compliance, including a Jehovah Witness chapel line (Id. at p. 25).
Defendants contend that Plaintiff was removed from Protestant services because he was previously allowed to attend as a "mistake," which was only discovered after the PREA investigation (Id. at p. 20-22). Multiple other prisoners were also taken off of theProtestant chapel services around this time after the chapel lines were reviewed for accuracy with the listed denomination for each prisoner (Id. at p. 21). Defendants contend that Plaintiff was disruptive during services at various times, and the safety and security of the institution is "at risk" if an offender is socializing and not paying attention (or is disruptive) during services (Id. at p. 26). Defendant Sterrett testified that volunteers who run the services reported that Plaintiff had been disruptive of the services at various points (Id.).
On April 28, 2018, Plaintiff filed an emergency grievance, detailing that Defendants Pickford, Walker, and Sterrett retaliated against plaintiff for filing a PREA complaint by removing him from religious services (Doc. 76, p. 31). He asks to have his religious services reinstated and an investigation into the retaliation claim he makes in this grievance (Id.). The warden reviewed this grievance on May 7,...
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